Foil Vedanta demo on 5 August 2016. A Protester from affected community holds a placard. Photocredit: Peter Marshall

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA via Miriam Rose

Loud and theatrical protests will again be held outside the AGM of British mining company Vedanta Resources'(1) AGM at the Lincoln Centre, Lincoln Inn Fields, London at 2pmon Monday 14th August(2) accusing the company of major environmental and human rights abuses across its operations. Parallel protests will be held by affected communities and their supporters at several locations in India and Zambia. Inside the AGM, dissident shareholders will ask questions on behalf of Zambian villagers who are suing Vedanta in the UK for twelve years of polluted water, as well as tribal inhabitants of the Niyamgiri hills in Odisha, India who accuse Vedanta of murdering and harassing them with state collusion.

Protesters in London will pour scorn on Vedanta’s 2017 Annual Report, which claims that the company ‘demonstrate world-class standards of governance, safety, sustainability and social responsibility’. They say it represents a poor attempt to don the ‘cloak of respectability'(3) of a London listing, pointing out that:

Vedanta’s Annual Report makes no mention of its liabilities relating to the landmark legal case in which 1,826 Zambian farmers have been granted jurisdiction to sue Vedanta in London for gross pollution by its subsidiary Konkola Copper Mines (KCM).(4)

At the July appeal hearing in the case, Vedanta’s lawyers claimed that the company’s sustainability and human rights reports are only produced for show as a requirement of London Stock Exchange rules. Instead they claimed Vedanta Resources has very little actual oversight or involvement with subsidiary operations such as Konkola Copper Mines.1

Vedanta are again subject of an international arbitration for withholding $100 million in dividends from Cairn Energy, owner of 9.8% shares in Vedanta controlled oil company Cairn India.2 In December 2016 London courts ordered Vedanta subsidiary Konkola Copper Mines to pay$103 million in withheld dividends to Zambian State entity ZCCM-IH.3

While their Annual Report claims to respect the right to ‘Free Prior Informed Consent’, Vedanta has not given up its plans to mine the Niyamgiri hills, despite a unanimous referendum against it by tribal inhabitants in 2013. The Odisha Mining Corporation has filed a new plea with the National Green Tribunal to overturn the referendum, claiming it overstepped the provisions of the Forest Rights Act by allowing Palli Sabhas to decide on mining, rather than merely settling their claims.5

The Dongria Konds of Niyamgiri will hold a protest before the AGM demanding the dismantling the Lanjigarh refinery, and an end to its illegal expansion. They will also demand the release of Dongria activists from jail, decrying the ongoing abductions, false arrests and State sponsored murders of tribal activists against Vedanta’s mine. In May Kuni Sikaka, a 20 year old Dongria woman and active Niyamgiri Suraksha Samiti member, whose father in law is NSS leader Dadhi Pusika, was removed from her home and kept in police jail for 3 days, where she was told to surrender as a Maoist or be jailed for 15 years. On 7th April 2016 Dasru Kadraka, a 25-year-old Adivasi youth leader and activist of NSS, was arrested and tortured with electric shocks by police asking him to surrender as a Maoist. An all female fact finding team comprising of senior Indian activists detailed these abuses in May 2017.6In September 2016 a group of Dongria Kond had burned down a CRPF (Central Reserve Police Force) camp, opposing construction of a road connecting Niyamgiri to Kalyansingpur, which they claim is to aid Vedanta’s mine plans, and opposing ongoing harassment by the force.7

In Zambia severely polluted villagers will submit questions to be asked by dissident shareholders at the London AGM.(5) Government officials visited their villages in Spring this year asking them to drop the London case against Vedanta and settle out of court with the company.

Samarendra Das from Foil Vedanta says:

“The UK Government and London Stock Exchange are directly responsible for failing to investigate Vedanta’s corporate crimes in Zambia since 2006. The Zambian State’s threats to polluted farmers demonstrate the ongoing colonial power of this British corporation which acts more powerful than the Zambian State.”

Former Rio Tinto CEO Tom Albanese will step down from Vedanta’s board at this year’s AGM along with executives Euan MacDonald and Aman Mehta. Vedanta’s CEO of Zambian operations Steven Din has recently been accused of offering bribes for the Simandou iron ore mine by the former Guinean mining minister, as part of a major corruption investigation. Din was head of Rio Tinto’s Guinean operation at the time the scandal unfolded, while Tom Albanese was CEO.8

Foil Vedanta are a London based international solidarity group focusing on the activities of British mining company Vedanta. We link up global communities affected by Vedanta, and hold them to account in London. We are currently making the case for Vedanta to be de-listed from the London Stock Exchange for their human rights and corporate governance abuses.

Former Director General of the Confederation of British Industries,Richard Lambert, stated: ‘It never occurred to those of us who helped to launch the FTSE 100 index 27 years ago that one day it would be providing a cloak of respectability and lots of passive investors for companies that challenge the canons of corporate governance such as Vedanta…’.10.

1,826 of the most affected villagers won the right to have their case against KCM and Vedanta, demanding compensation for personal injury and loss of livelihood due to gross pollution, heard in UK courts in May 2016. Vedanta’s appeal to the judgment was heard in July 2017 and a verdict is expected in September/October.

Justice Coulson’s May judgement indicted KCM for financial secrecy, historic dishonesty and attempts to pervert the course of justice, revealing that KCM have never filed any annual accounts in accordance with the Zambian Companies Act, and referring to a 2014 London arbitration case against KCM in which three judges found KCM to be dishonest, obstructive and willing to cause unnecessary harm.11

Reports have detailed how twelve years of pollution by KCM has turned the river Kafue into a ‘river of acid’1213 and left the farmers with no access to clean water. As well as suing KCM and Vedanta in the UK for personal injury and loss of livelihood due to gross pollution, the villagers are demanding that KCM de-silt and remediate the contaminated areas so they can return to normal life.

An estimated 40,000 people in total are affected by contaminated water which also affects the municipal piped water system14. A number of scientific papers have documented the extent of contamination, with acid pH and heavy metal content regularly tens and even hundreds of times above legal limits.151617

15Ondra Sracek et al, 2011, ‘Mining-related contamination of surface water and sediments of the Kafue River drainage system in the Copperbelt district, Zambia: An example of a high neutralization capacity system’, Journal of Geochemical Exploration, 112 (2012) 174–188.

15th February. On Monday up to 500 people declared a hunger strike and indefinite protest against the planned expansion of Vedanta subsidiary Sterlite’s copper smelter in Thoothukudi (Tuticorin), Tamil Nadu. Two days into the protest police rounded up and arrested 270 people including many women and children, eventually releasing all except eight so-called […]

18th Jan 2018 In the third major London case against Vedanta subsidiary Konkola Copper Mines (KCM) since 2014, the English High Court on January 2nd ordered KCM to pay $139 million plus costs to Zambian government entity ZCCM Investment Holdings (ZCCM-IH) for sums owed as part of a copper and cobalt price participation agreement dating […]

12th December 2017. Despite the cold, a loud and theatrical protest was again held outside the AGM of British mining company Global Coal Resources Management (GCM) at the Aeronautical Society in 4 Hamilton Place in London at 10am today. In solidarity with the communities in Phulbari, where three people were shot dead as paramilitary officers […]

20th October 2017. On Tuesday the Securities and Exchange Commission filed a fraud case against Rio Tinto and two of its executives Tom Albanese (until recently Vedanta’s CEO) and Guy Elliot for inflating the value of a misguided coal deal with Mozambique in 2011. Rio Tinto was immediately fined £27.4 million by the Financial Conduct […]

13th October 2017. Judges today threw out Vedanta’s appeal to the May 2016 High Court judgment allowing Zambian farmers to have their case against the company heard in the UK. The judgment adds further weight to precedents holding UK companies legally responsible for the actions of their subsidiaries. Judges today released their verdict on Vedanta’s […] […]

7th September. This year was Vedanta’s 14th AGM, since registering on the London Stock Exchange in December 2003, and the 14th year that dissident shareholders have attended the meeting to hold the company to account for their environmental and human rights abuses. The minutes published by activist shareholders every year, documenting the company’s response […]

14th August 2017. Loud and theatrical protests were again held outside the AGM of British mining company Vedanta Resources’ at the Lincoln Centre, Lincoln Inn Fields, London at 2pm today accusing the company of major environmental and human rights abuses across its operations. Parallel protests and meetings were held today by affected communities and their [ […]

The annual Global Day of Action against Vedanta will take place on Monday 14th August 2017, as their AGM is conducted in London. While the Vedanta board try to don the ‘cloak of respectability’ of their London listing, communities affected by the company’s pollution, human rights abuses and tax evasion around the world will raise their […]

6th July. This report is a detailed account of hearings in Vedanta’s appeal against Justice Coulson’s 2016 judgment allowing the case of Zambian villagers polluted by KCM/Vedanta to be heard in the UK, which took place during the 5th and 6th July. At 9am on Wednesday 5th of July activists from Foil Vedanta Pan African […]

5th July 2017. The latest hearing in the case of the Chingola communities consistently polluted by Vedanta subsidiary Konkola Copper Mines (KCM) began at the Court of Appeals in London today. A rally organised by Foil Vedanta with Pan African solidarity groups took place outside the court in solidarity with the victims of ongoing pollution […]